Appointed mayor has ‘no interest’ in seeking election next April

WOOD RIVER — When the dust settles after next April’s election, Wood River will have its third different mayor in as many years.

Mayor Frank Akers said Wednesday that he has no plans to run for the seat in the April 4 election.

“I had made it pretty clear when I agreed to serve as mayor that I had no interest in seeking election when it was time,” Akers said. “I had been elected to a four-year term as a member of the City Council, and at first I had no interest in serving as mayor. But then I was encouraged by many people to go ahead and do that, so what I thought was, alright, I will serve two years as mayor to let things get sorted out here, and then I’ll let somebody else take it over. So, that has been my plan all along, and that’s still my plan.”

Akers, 64, was appointed to the seat in April 2015 after late Mayor Fred Ufert passed away a month earlier. Ufert had been the city’s mayor since 2005.

Akers has been a city official since 2010, when he was appointed to the City Council seat vacated by Kyle Anderson. He won election to a four-year term in 2011 and won re-election in 2015.

With three seats on the council coming open next April — the four-year terms of Scott Miner and Cheryl Maguire will be up, and a two-year term for the seat currently occupied by Tom Stalcup, who was appointed to fill Akers’ spot when he became mayor, will also be up for election — there are plenty of opportunities for Akers to continue in a leadership role, even if it isn’t as mayor, but he said he isn’t interested in running for any office.

“That’s the thing that I dislike most about it — I worked in so many campaigns of other people over the years that I always thought I would enjoy campaigning for myself. I don’t,” Akers said. “It really surprised me when I had some self-discovery on the issue. I don’t like campaigning for myself. If I wanted to campaign, I would have probably run for mayor, but I don’t want to campaign.”

Miner, a 21-year-old, first-term councilman, last month announced his intention to run for mayor. Filing deadline for office is Dec. 19.

Reach reporter Nathan Grimm at 618-208-6451 or on Twitter @GrimmTelegraph.